Ramblings of a post-denominational frummer yid. Comments to benchorin613@yahoo.com

Friday, November 14, 2008

Most people who sound off on politics share the rather tedious habit of being mindless partisans. The interesting ones identify strongly with a point of view generally associated with some political camp, but still manage to call 'em as they see 'em. One such person is Camille Paglia, whose in-your-face raunchy style is not in the least off-putting (to me) because it is accompanied by total disrespect for the orthodoxies of her own camp as well as others.

For one outstanding example, her fisking of Catherine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin's feminist anti-pornography crusade is priceless. (I couldn't find it online but her book Vamps and Tramps is worth getting just for the MacKinnon and Dworkin stuff. Warning: This stuff is not suitable for those who are, um, makpid on shemiras einayim and oznayim or would have their kids believe that they are.) This week she has a piece in Salon on Obama and Palin that is very much worth reading (especially the second page).

(Nudnik pre-emption: Yes, my definition of "tedious" and "partisan" in this context is equally applicable to right and left.)

1 Comments:

Y. Ben-David said...

Nice, honest piece. However, it is indeed frightening for those of us here in Israel suffocating for decades under an undemocratic regime with a controlled-media stifling discussion of vital national issues in their lock-step assualts on the usual "enemies of the people"-e.g. (Netanyahu-not that I am such a big fan of his, Haredim, Judea/Samaria settlers, etc). For years we looked to the US as a beacon of democracy that we hoped Israel would eventually use as inspiration, but rather we see the opposite is happening...the crazed Left in the US is using Israel as a model for what they are trying to become.

Just one thing....could someone enlighten me on what the controversy about Obama's birth certificate is....are they claiming that he is not a "Native born citizen of the US" which is required of someone who wants to become President?